• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.61-72
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• 2014

Study on effluent organic matter (EfOM) characteristic and removal efficiency is required, because EfOM is important in regard to the stability of effluents reuse, quality issues of artificial recharge and water conservation of aqueous system. UV technology is widely used in wastewater treatment. Many reports have been conducted on microbial disinfection and micro pollutant reduction with UV treatment. However, the study on EfOM with UV has limited because low/medium pressure UV lamp is not sufficient to affect refractory organics. The high intensity of pulsed UV would mineralize EfOM itself as well as change the characteristics of EfOM. Chlorine demand and DBPs formation is affected on the changed amounts and properties of EfOM. The objective of this study is to investigate the effect on EfOM, chlorine residual, and chlorinated DBPs formation with low pressure and pulsed UV treatment. The removal of organic matter through low pressure UV treatment is insignificant effect. Pulsed UV treatment effectively removes/transforms EfOM. As a result, the chlorine consumption is changed and chlorine DBPs formation is decreased. However, excessive UV treatment caused problems of increasing chlorine consumption and generating unknown by-products.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.257-274
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• 2020

There are many previous review articles are available to summarize either the characterization methods of effluent organic matter (EfOM) or the individual control treatment options. However, there has been no attempt made to compare in parallel the physicochemical treatment options that target the removal of EfOM from biological treatments. This review deals with the recent progress on the characterization of EfOM and the novel technologies developed for EfOM treatment. Based on the publications after 2010, the advantages and the limitations of several popularly used analytical tools are discussed for EfOM characterization, which include UV-visible and fluorescence spectroscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), size exclusion chromatography (SEC), and Fourier transform-ion cyclotron resonance-mass spectrometry (FT-ICR-MS). It is a recent trend to combine an SEC system with various types of detectors, because it can successfully track the chemical/functional composition of EfOM, which varies across a continuum of different molecular sizes. FT-ICR-MS is the most powerful tool to detect EfOM at molecular levels. However, it is noted that this method has rarely been utilized to understand the changes of EfOM in pre-treatment or post-treatment systems. Although membrane filtration is still the preferred method to treat EfOM before its discharge due to its high separation selectivity, the minimum requirements for additional chemicals, the ease of scaling up, and the continuous operation, recent advances in ion exchange and advanced oxidation processes are greatly noteworthy. Recent progress in the non-membrane technologies, which are based on novel materials, are expected to enhance the removal efficiency of EfOM and even make it feasible to selectively remove undesirable fractions/compounds from bulk EfOM.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.185-199
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• 2017

Low-pressure membrane filtration is increasingly used for tertiary treatment of wastewater effluent organic matter (EfOM), mainly comprising organic base/neutral compounds. In-line coagulation with underdosing, charge neutralization, and sweep floc conditions prior to ultrafiltration (UF) was studied to determine removals of the EfOM components and consequent reduction of fouling using polyethersulfone membranes. Coagulation and UF substantially reduced fouling for all coagulation conditions while removing from 7 to 38% of EfOM organic acids. From 7 to 16% of EfOM organic base/neutrals were removed at neutral pH but there was no significant removal for slightly acid coagulation conditions even though fouling was substantially reduced. Sweep floc produced the lowest resistance to filtration but may be inappropriate for in-line use due to the large added volume of solids. Charge-neutralization resulted in poor recovery of the initial flux with hydraulic cleaning. Under-dosing paralleled sweep floc in reducing hydraulic resistance to filtration (for sub-critical flux) and the initial flux was also easily recovered with hydraulic cleaning. Hydrophobic and hydrophilic base/neutrals were identified on the fouled membranes but as previously reported the extent of fouling was not correlated with accumulation of organic base/neutrals.

• Ecology and Resilient Infrastructure
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.128-135
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• 2019

This study evaluates the effect of dissolved effluent organic matter (SE-dEfOM) from sewage wastewater treatment plants on the adsorption and estrogenic activity of bisphenol A (BPA). Specific ultraviolet absorbance and fluorescence index analyses indicated that SE-dEfOM was mainly microbially derived non-humic substances differed from Suwannee River natural organic matter (SR-NOM) as reference. Both Langmuir and Freundlich models successfully explained the adsorption of BPA onto both SE-dEfOM and SR-NOM. Additionally, the SE-dEfOM showed higher binding capacities and affinities for BPA than those of SR-NOM, resulting in better reduction of the estrogenic activity of BPA. These findings suggest that the binding and toxicity of BPA are largely dependent on the source of organic matters.

• Proceedings of the Membrane Society of Korea Conference
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• 2000.07a
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• pp.1-38
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• 2000

• Korean Journal of Environmental Biology
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.48-55
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• 2016

This study investigates the effect of effluent organic matter (EfOM) from sewage wastewater treatment plants on estrogenic activity reduction of bisphenol A (BPA) by UV photolysis. The EfOM and Suwannee River natural organic matter (SR-NOM) as reference were isolated into hydrophobic (HPO), transphilic (TPI) and hydrophilic (HPI) fractions depending on polarity. The specific ultraviolet absorbance (SUVA) analysis indicated that EfOM showed similar properties to microbially derived organic matters with low hydrophobicity, which is different from SR-NOM having high hydrophobicity. UV irradiation upto 3 hr significantly reduced SUVA values of both EfOM and SR-NOM (p<0.0001), depending on the polarity of organic matters. In the absence of organic matters, the relative estrogenic activity (REA) of BPA ($5.0{\times}10^{-5}M$) was decreased from 86% to 63% by UV photolysis (2 hr). However, the decrease of mean REA was from 68% to 37% in the presence of organic matters, which was significantly independent on the type (EfOM or SR-NOM) and polarity (HPO, TPI or HPI) of organic matters (p>0.05). As a result, the reduced REA by UV photolysis of BPA with and without organic matters was 31% and 23%, respectively, suggesting that both EfOM and SR-NOM accelerated the photolytic reduction of BPA estrogenic activity.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.36 no.8
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• pp.542-548
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• 2014

Effects of bromide ($Br^-$) and iodide ($I^-$) concentrations, chlorine ($Cl_2$) doses, pH, temperature, ammonia nitrogen concentrations, reaction times and water characteristics on formation of iodinated trihalomethanes (I-THMs) during oxidation of iodide containing water with chlorine were investigated in this study. Results showed that the yields of I-THMs increased with the high bromide and iodide level during chlorination. The elevated pH significantly increased the yields of I-THMs during chlorination. The formation of I-THMs was higher at $20^{\circ}C$ than $4^{\circ}C$, $10^{\circ}C$ and $30^{\circ}C$. In chloramination study, addition of ammonium chloride ($NH_4Cl$) markedly increased the formation of I-THMs. Among the water samples collected from seven water sources including wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) effluent water (EfOM water), prepared humic containing water (HA water) and algal organic matter (AOM) containing water (AOM water), EfOM water generated the highest yields of I-THMs ($12.31{\mu}g/mg$ DOC), followed by HA water ($4.96{\mu}g/mg$ DOC), while AOM water produced the lowest yields of I-THMs ($0.99{\mu}g/mg$ DOC). $SUVA_{254}$ values of EfOM water, HA water and AOM water were $1.38L/mg{\cdot}m$, $4.96L/mg{\cdot}m$ and $0.97L/mg{\cdot}m$, respectively. The I-THMs yields had a low correlation with $SUVA_{254}$ values ($r^2$ = 0.002).

• Korean Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.45 no.1
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• pp.42-51
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• 2012

This study investigated the characteristics of natural organic matter (NOM) with general water characteristics (pH, DO, electrical conductivity, BOD, COD, TN, TP, Chl-$a$, DOC, $UV_{254}$, SUVA) and the 3D fluorescence excitation-emission matrix (FEEM) in the Yeongsan River basin. FEEM was used to classify protein-like and fulvic & humiclike substances with fluorescence intensity in the matrix of excitation and emission wavelength. The concentration of BOD, COD, TN, electrical conductivity and DOC in the region of Gwangju city (Gwangju sewage treatment plant: GJS, Gwangjucheon: GJC, Gwangju 2: GJ2) was relatively higher than the upper reaches and lower reaches of the Yeongsan River basin. SUVA in most sites was lower than 3 L $mg^{-1}\;m^{-1}$ as the hydrophilic substances, except Damyang (DY) in the upper reaches of Yeongsan river was higher than 3 L $mg^{-1}\;m^{-1}$ as the hydrophobic substances during winter and autumn. In the FEEM investigation the fulvic and humic substances were found in most sites, and in sites regarding Gwangju city (GJS, GJC, GJ2) during winter and GJC in summer, protein-like substances were found. The trend of fluorescence intensities from the upper reaches to the lower reaches in most sites corresponded to that regarding the concentration of water characteristics (BOD, COD, TN, DOC). That is why the region of Gwangju city (GJS, GJC, GJ2) was relatively higher. This results were an equivalent trend to those of fluorescence index (FI) in most sites, and the higher FIs in the sites of Gwangju city indicate more microbial-derived substances due to enormous effluent organic matters (EfOM) from huge Gwangju sewage treatment plants.